Customer Reviews

The Game: Win Your Life in 90 Days

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I played the game as a participant in the coaching program. It forever changed the way that I look at life. During the game I cleaned and reorganized closets, drawers and rooms. I built a zen garden in my backyard, painted a garden on my bedroom walls, reduced my body fat by 15% and increased my reading speed from 300 words per minute to 2600 words per minute. I recorded over 21,000 concious acts of will during the 90 days that I played the game.

The value of choosing a partner for this game is immeasurable. It's good to have another person to be accountable to. This structure was very effective for me on those days that I was tempted to let a work-out slide or if I just didn't feel like completing on a committment.

The book stresses the importance of structure, community and affinity in achieving goals. It guides the reader through exercises that help to put these in place. There are many real-life examples in the book from past "game" players. This clearly demonstrates that anyone can achieve their goals by putting the principles of The Game to work.

The tone of the book is conversational, making it very easy to read. This is not just another self-help or motivational book. If you truly have the desire to realign your priorites and live your life with passion and purpose, you will enjoy this book.

Kelley's book covers a lot. I hope to do it justice while giving you a sense of what you'll find in it. First of all, there really is a "Game" that the author challenges and instructs you to play for 90 days (The game is very much like goal setting exercises transformed into a game you play with a partner). Kelley provides the rules, the scoring system, the strategies, and even a grand prize reward of $50,000 for whichever partner-team he deems to have changed their lives the most in 90 days.

So what is the game? Well as the title implies, you are playing to improve your life dramatically. You choose the three or four areas you want to improve the most -- you are choosing from: Balance, Body and Health, Money, Relationships, Spiritual Life, Mind, Tools, Environment, Education, Family, Work, Charities, Hobbies, Interests, and Art. There is a chapter on each of these areas, full of excellent advice and true stories of previous game players, so that you have loads of strategies and inspiration to make your improvement. Let's say you read the book but opted to never register at the official website to play the game -- these chapters would still be worth the price. I liked the combination of smarts, specifics and spirituality woven into each one. But the originality of the book lies precisely in actually playing the game from start to finish -- from reading the book to turning in your final essay that extols your breakthroughs -- because the game provides an added motivation and support system that other books lack.

My final comment would be this -- the books easily worth the price. The question is, once you read it, will you have the determination to play for 90 days? Realistically most won't -- it is a big challenge. But the ones who do will undoubtedly make major improvements. How could you not? Conscious, concentrated, focus on improvement for 90 days will change anyone's life. I humbly submit that if you are interested in succeeding, you will also like my book, Major in Success, especially for career or college success, it would be a great complement to Sarano's excellent book.

Mr. Kelley provides a great conversation about all those 'messes, what-tos and to-dos' rattle around in mind. Why do we carry these for years and never perform? You know the lists: I have always wanted to get in shape, I'd really like a better relationship with my daughter, I should learn those cell phone features... and the like. Where do these come from and why are they always so frustratingly just out of reach?

More important than recognizing these frustrations, Mr. Kelley provides an elegant solution. In the form of a Game, a very special game, he challenges and empowers us to climb life's mountains whether actual or symbolic. This book is not about theory. It is a wake-up call and a will get you too to perform. In the end, like with all good games, there is a PRIZE.

The book is well written and easily read. It is full of personal stories from both Mr. Kelley and from his clients built up over years of coaching successful people to even higher performance. And, along the way you will learn some timeless lessons about what it is to be human. A future Classic.

Being a psychiatrist I am exposed to man theories, publications, and other forms of communication regarding improving ones's life. As you can imagine I have become rather skeptical about this genre of "self help" titles. I began reading The Game by Mr. Kelley with a fairly high degree of doubt whether it would have any meaning or standout from other works of its ilk in any way. I must say I was pleasantly suprised and found Part I of to be an excellent outline for the one thing we all strive for... some degree of CONTROL in our lives. Mr. Kelley gives a clear and consise plan to begin this process, followed by more detail in Part II & III, on how to accomplish this life long task. Having been an athlete The Game strikes a cord prompting me to re-examine several aspects of my life and make some changes. This was no mean feat for a cynical physician. I am even going to offer The Game to the employees in my practice as a Holiday gift. One will not find the Holy Grail in any book of this nature, or anywhere else for that matter, but with The Game at least you can begin the search.

I recently had the ability to listen to Sarano speak, and I have read his book. Outstanding to say the least. He helps YOU realize what YOUR potential is and he helps YOU open your eyes to what is holding you back from being the best you can be. In all honestly, he made me face the things that I hated to face, and didn't want too, more importantly the truth. After you realize what is holding you back, he gets you on track to make the changes you need to make, not in the future, but in the NOW. I would recommend this book to anyone wanting to better themselves no matter if it professionally, personally, or spiritually.

I have been playing the game for over 90 days and the changes are amazing. I am more focused, relaxed and my business and perosnal relationships are being transfomred. Reading this book will dramatically change your life.

I marvel at the original concept of this "game" and the insightful manner which allows the reader to look deep inside their own self and do some serious soul-searching. Like life in the real world, this game covers a wide variety of topics: Balance, Body and Health, Money, Relationships, Spirituality, Tools, Environment, Education, Family, Work, Charities, Hobbies, etc. For the most part, these are areas that make up our everyday life and finding the time, energy and resources to pull all these aspects of our life together is not an easy task. Often the demands in our life seem too great and usually the last person we find time for is ourself. In addition, many couples do not make the time to strengthen the relationship they have with their partner. Strong lasting realtionships do not just happen; like a beautiful garden, they require constant nurturing if they are to grow and survive. The author's concepts and advice on how to find balance and harmony in all these areas, and strengthen relationships, causes one to seriously contemplate what is truly important in life's journey, and what is less important and really quite insignificant in the whole overall picture. The only commitment one must have for maximum benefit is the commitment of the full 90 days. As a counsellor, I can attest to the fact that for most people it will take at least that long, if not longer, to change old habits.

This is a book, a game, and an adventure into self-discovery. Ideally the book works best if you have a partner, and is centred around that concept - definitely worth a five star rating.

Saraon is right we are all aslep. we get up, do our thing and hardly notice where we are and what we are doing. Very few of us reach our potential. Very few of us build on relationships and let friends help us. We all think we have to do it ourselves and end up frustrated because we know we have not reached our full potential. Sarano's insights into the humnan psyche are right on. He has found a way for us to wake up and reach for new levels of success. There is not a person on this earth that will not learn and grow if they apply just some of the ideas put forth by Sarano. Ted Fuller

The Game is deceptively simple in construct. In chapter after chapter,busy people tell how applying simple disciplines worked in their lives when they competed in the "game". The people are real. The changes in their lives are real, and some of them are dramatic. But the practical, simple, transforming work of the book is for each of us to decisively intervene on our own behalf in the sleepiness of daily life so that it becomes for us the miracle it really is. Yes, after a hundred pages or so the format of the story told is repetitive and even a little dull. The real news is however, that the book will do nothing in anyone's life who does not go to the website or call for help in setting up to play the game. Reading about the game will not do it! Only players savor the sweat and reap the benefits. If a prospective reader really wants to do something to enliven areas of her/his life then reading The Game combined with playing it with structure, affinity and community will alter the reader's level of awareness and increase the delight possible only in being present in the moment.

I sat through a Sarano Kelley seminar a few years ago while I was employed with a financial services firm. He is a dynamic speaker to say the least. He is also incredibly manipulative. He has a way of convincing everyone in the room they are "asleep" and need his "Game" very urgently. His game, or the away from home motivational boot camp he puts together in San Diego, costs over $20,000.00! You get up early in the morning, go through high physical exhaustion, highly emotional conversations, and then you get to the training sessions. When you are exhausted and emotional you are at your most vulnerable to suggestion. This is classic nuerolinguistic programming, or NLP. NLP techniques are how cults brainwash people. Look it up!

Sarano also loved to talk about the movie The Matrix and how it was like real life. I guess he likens himself to the character of Morpheus. He has the way, the answers, the road to being awake in life while others sleep. Classic hucksterism.

I went away from his seminar convinced I was a piece of crap and needed fixing. I even considered the whole "Game" program. I also knew I was manipulated. I soon started to get phone calls from their sales department trying to pressure me into the program. "Just put it on your credit card" they would tell me. When I asked them to stop the calls the sales person said, "Well, it's obvious you're not coachable." The high pressure stuff felt evil and insincere!

I will never forget Sarano. I will also never look at the whole business of motivational speakers the same again. I'm sure some are great and sincere. Some are nothing more than mind games that feed off of the frailty of the human condition.

Don't buy his book. Don't drink the Coolaid.